Case Study: Jefferson County, Alabama achieves faster, life‑saving tornado alerts and resilient emergency communications with Everbridge

Jefferson County, Alabama, leans on Everbridge for resilience amid frequent tornadoes

Jefferson County, Alabama — the state’s most populous and most tornado-prone county, serving over 670,000 residents — faced a critical communications challenge: an outdated siren system (255 sirens across 1,100 sq. miles) that was slow, unreliable in hilly terrain, vulnerable to power outages, and often ineffective for fast-moving or nighttime storms. Emergency managers needed a faster, more inclusive way to warn people and coordinate lifesaving response and access after storms.

By adopting Everbridge, the county now sends interactive, geotargeted alerts and pushes updates to social media and response teams, including multilingual templates and text alerts for the hearing-impaired. During a fast overnight tornado in January 2021, Jefferson County sent over 60,000 Everbridge alerts before sirens activated; since then the platform has improved road closure communications, situational awareness, and the county’s ability to reach and protect residents quickly.

Jefferson County, Alabama

Jim Coker

Director